1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a rotary internal combustion engine and more particularly, to a rotary engine apparatus which includes an upper toroidal casing and a lower toroidal casing having a rotor with a piston, and an ignition and explosion zone disposed between the piston and a valve in a closed position, which are disposed in the toroidal casings, respectively, whereby rotation of the rotor of the rotary engine is achieved by continuously transferring a compressed air-fuel mixture into the ignition and explosion zone, igniting and exploding the mixture continuously, and continuously exhausting the gases of combustion in the closed valve position, and thereafter, the piston passes through the valve in an open position and simultaneously, the gases of combustion do not exhaust.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Various types of internal combustion engines are well known in the art. For example, in the combustion cycle of the conventional piston engine, the piston must always come to a complete stop and reverse direction and the piston requires a connecting rod and crankshaft to convert its up and down motion into a torque. On the other hand, the rotary engine directly generates torque although in some designs of the rotary engine a "top dead center" type of problem still exists. In the rotary engine, the engine is provided which has fewer moving parts, has less weight and occupies less space, for a comparable horsepower.
Furthermore, the piston of the internal combustion engine is inefficient in its use of the power available in the exploded airfuel mixture. If a piston engine has a 3-inch stroke, then the crank distance, i.e. the distance from the center of the drive shaft to the center of the crank bearing where the driving pressure is applied, is 1.5 inches. In the piston engine, the pressure from the explosion is applied with full efficiency only when the connecting rod is at right angles to the crank, i.e., when there is maximum leverage on the crank. Thus, as the crank turns from the top-dead-center position of the piston, where the pressure from the explosion in relation to the torque is zero, the leverage efficiency increases progressively until the right-angle position is achieved, and then drops off until the crankshaft reaches the bottom-dead-center position of the piston, where the leverage efficiency again is zero. Hence, the only significant productive leverage on the crank shaft from the pressure applied is derived between the 2 and 4 o'clock positions of the revolution of the crank shaft. Thus, only at this time is there efficient conversion into power output of the pressure of the explosion of the air-fuel mixture in the piston engine.
Rotary automobile engines have advantages over piston engines in that by the utilization of a rotor, which rotates within a stationary enclosure, the piston of the conventional internal combustion engine is eliminated.
A number of suggestions have been made to employ a rotor mounted for rotation within a stationary casing and including a plurality of retractable vanes mounted substantially radially in the rotor.
A typical example of such a rotary engine is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 1,279,195, in which a substantially circular rotor is mounted in an elliptical chamber. U.S. Pat. No. 917,165 also discloses a circular rotor which is mounted in an elliptical casing and provided with vanes which engage the inner walls of the casing. In these prior art engines, the pressure of the compressed gases before ignition tends to prevent the vanes from extending to engage the chamber wall.
Also, the "Wankel" engine includes a three-cornered cam motor mounted in a geared manner to a power take-off shaft. The chamber is of a generally oval cross-sectional shape and each of the three corners of the cam engage the inner wall of the chamber during rotation. In order to achieve this, the cam has a central circular opening having gear teeth on the inner face and these teeth mesh with a small pinion gear mounted on the power take-off shaft. The cam therefore rotates eccentrically about the power take-off shaft.
U.S. Pat. 3,780,708 discloses a rotary combustion engine which includes a rotor concentric with and rotatable about a stator having a plurality of baffles with the rotor and stator cooperatively defining a plurality of working chambers that are spaced about and rotate with the rotor.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,791,353 discloses a rotary engine which includes a plurality of elongated vanes, abutments, recesses, and chambers therein. All of the engines of the above patents are complicate in construction, difficult in use, and expensive to manufacture. Furthermore, such engines have proven to be unpractical for various purpose.
In order to avoid such problems, the present inventor is prosecuting U.S. patent application Ser. No. 07/394,535, filed Aug. 16, 1989, which includes an upper cylindrical casing and a lower cylindrical casing having a rotor with a piston, and an ignition and explosion zone disposed between the piston and a valve in the cylindrical casings, respectively, whereby rotation of the rotor of the rotary engine is achieved by transferring a compressed air-fuel mixture into the ignition and explosion zone, igniting and exploding the mixture, and exhausting the gases of combustion.